ATLANTA — When people say “Shaq -is everywhere,” it’s hardly an exaggeration.
The NBA Hall of Fame center may have retired from basketball 14 years ago, but Shaquille O’Neal has seamlessly transformed himself into an amusing and likable pitchman for a wide variety of advertisers.
Watch him dance at a high school prom with the animated cartoon general for The General Insurance. See him lead a cavalcade of warriors to fight pain for Icy Hot. Giggle while he goofily cavorts, fully dressed, in a pool for Carnival Cruises.
And, despite being a former athlete, he can shamelessly hawk a cholesterol bomb Shaq-a-Roni pizza for Papa John’s, packed with extra cheese and pepperoni.
“I try to use a lot of humor,” Shaq said in a phone interview with The Atlanta Journal-Constitution. “I try to redefine how a commercial should be done. When I do a commercial, I try not to just make it about selling stuff. Too many people do that. Hopefully you remember the silly stuff.”
Mike Lewis, a marketing professor at the Goizueta Business School at Emory University who specializes in sports marketing, has done an annual survey of 50 to 60 celebrities over several years to gauge their popularity. Three names pop up regularly as the most trustworthy: Dolly Parton, Dwayne “The Rock” Johnson and Shaq.
“They’re all larger-than-life characters,” Lewis said. “They’re self-deprecating, they’re funny and they have long histories of excellence.”
“In some ways, all celebrities play a character,” he added. “Shaq’s character feels like it’s the real manifestation of who Shaq is.”
His prolific presence on TV is no illusion. iSpot, which tracks TV commercials, has more than 300 Shaq-related ads to view on its online portfolio going back three decades to his early days promoting Pepsi, Taco Bell and Reebok.
Shaq — who owns a home in McDonough and will continue to co-host “Inside the NBA” from Turner Studios in Midtown even though the show will leave TNT for ESPN next season— often invests in the companies he endorses.
Beyond being a brand ambassador for Papa Johns, he owns nine metro Atlanta Papa Johns franchises and spent five years on the board of directors before rolling off last year. (Papa John’s has dual headquarters in Louisville, Kentucky, and Atlanta.)
He also owns the Krispy Kreme on Ponce de Leon Avenue, which he rebuilt for $1.4 million in 2023 after the prior building burned down. (He doesn’t partake in the doughnuts like he used to. “My new trainer doesn’t let me eat like that anymore,” he said.)
Shaq said he likes to be actively involved with his advertisers on both a creative and strategic level, and he even holds an annual summit for them.
“I’m big on teamwork and championships,” he said, before using a basketball analogy: “As the ad agency, they’re the point guards. I read the copy, Shaq-ify it and, as the center, I deliver. It’s totally a team effort.”
The General Insurance is a prime example of Shaq’s impact. Shaq has helped expand the brand awareness of The General, which focuses on high-risk drivers. (Sentry Insurance recently purchased The General for $1.7 billion from American Family Insurance.)
He recalled using The General when he was at Louisiana State University and said the company took good care of him. A quarter century later, he wanted to return the favor.
“It was the first insurance I had before I became the Shaq-ster,” he said. “Now I’m the Shaq-ster, you want me to switch up and go with the big boys? I’m staying with The General!”
Rob Jenners, who produced a podcast with Shaq and radio host John Kincade for several years out of Atlanta, recalled Shaq meeting The General’s CEO, Randy Parker, for the first time in 2016 to tape a special podcast for employees.
“They had these formal questions written out on a piece of paper,” Jenners said. “Shaq took the paper from them and put it on the table. ‘I just want you to talk to me. This isn’t an interview. Let’s talk about what you do, why it helps people and how I can help get the message out.’”
Since then, Shaq has created dozens of ads for The General, the latest featuring him with T-Pain, the Atlanta-based musician known for his use of Auto-Tune. That, of course, is the source of humor in the ad.
Chauncey Citchens, director of marketing for The General, said T-Pain is often misjudged and underestimated — similar to The General — and Shaq had fun with that dynamic.
“They made a good pairing,” she said.
The best part of being on set with Shaq, she said, is when he goes off script: “That’s when the magic happens. We give him space to just be himself.”
Shaq is also a magical pied piper with children, she said: “The last time we were on set, a bus came up and a bunch of kids came out. He stopped shooting and signed autographs. It was crazy.”
Shaq has a clear memory of his first TV ad, which was seen by tens of millions of people: a 1994 Pepsi commercial that aired during the Super Bowl. He enters a basketball court and finds out the cooler has no Pepsi. He approaches a kid and is about to grab the boy’s Pepsi, but the kid, an impish grin on his face, says, “Don’t even think about it!”
But his off-court exploits for a time were more focused on other areas.
In 1994 he released “Shaq Fu,” a Sega video game that flopped. His 1996 comedy film “Kazaam,” in which he played a genie, is still the butt of jokes. He also released four rap albums and contributed bars for Michael Jackson.
“Shaq came into the league as a giant and kind of an angry guy,” said Steve Koonin, a former TBS/TNT executive who is now chief executive officer of the Atlanta Hawks and State Farm Arena. “He wanted to be a rapper. He wanted to be Superman. Today, he’s America’s teddy bear. I think his success off the court has been as powerful as his success on the court. He’s just a wonderful guy.”
But even Shaq has occasionally missed a basket.
For about a year, he was a spokesman for the cryptocurrency exchange FTX, which went belly-up in 2022. Shareholders sued, and earlier this year, Shaq agreed to pay $1.8 million to settle a class-action lawsuit.
“I think with a fraud case, it will all come down to the nature of the fraud and whether consumers hold the spokespeople culpable,” Lewis said. “Off hand, I can’t think of an example where a corporate scandal harmed an endorser’s brand equity.”
Shaq runs an active charity foundation and generates occasional stories about his random acts of generosity.
In 2021, for instance, Shaq was caught on video paying for an engagement ring for a guy he saw at a Zales, no questions asked.
“I’m into making people happy,” O’Neal said on “Inside the NBA” when asked about it. “I didn’t mean for that to get out because I don’t do it for that.”
He also maintains a largely apolitical public face. He admitted on a podcast to only voting for the first time in 2020 while refusing to say who he voted for.
“My thought is that if you are not an expert on it or if you haven’t been doing it, don’t do it,” he told CNBC in 2020.
Justin Pettigrew, a Kennesaw State University professor of public relations, said in such divisive political times, taking such a stance “certainly makes him more appealing to a broader audience.”
Shaq’s life philosophy is simple: Keep hustling.
“I enjoy working,” he said. “I enjoy the opportunity. My grandfather told me something one time. I was complaining about something stupid and he said, ‘It could be worse.’ I take those words to heart. I’m grateful to still be working and still be in demand.”
But is there such a thing as too much Shaq?
“The way he has built his brand he can probably do 10 more things and it wouldn’t feel like he’s wearing his name out,” Lewis said. “He has a knack for bringing people into the joke.”
